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The Witch of Atlas

Introduction

The Witch of Atlas, Bantock’s Tone Poem No 5, is a particularly effective example of his preoccupation with the interpretation of unusual subjects. It was composed in 1902 and first performed on 10 September at the Worcester meeting of the Three Choirs Festival; the composer himself conducted. The subject is derived from Shelley’s poem of the same name, Bantock choosing a mere 44 of the 672 lines the poet had written at white heat between 13 and 16 August 1820. The 44 lines are printed in the score with letters identifying the relevent passages in the music.

This selection by-passes much of the wizardry and mischief of the Witch, not to mention the strange hermaphroditic companion she creates (a typical Shellean image of bisexual creativity), concentrating instead upon her seductive beauty and beneficence. This Bantock depicts by means of a rising, Mahlerian theme announced at the outset by solo violin against a background of tremolo strings, which becomes the main thematic source for the whole piece. Despite a brief, riotous central passage, the dominant mood is that of ecstatic, sensuous longing. In any other country such a work would have become a staple item in the romantic orchestral repertoire.

Recordings

'Magnificently recorded and performed. When audiences are crying out for 'melodious music' how can such music as this have been ignored for so long?' ...'A towering classic, as important as a landmark in the rediscovery of British music as it is a monument to the technique of orchestral recording. Musi ...» More

'Bantock's prodigious output as a composer … rested in the long grass for decades until Vernon Handley's Hyperion recordings revealed the many qu ...'What an achievement! Twenty-one late-romantic orchestral works in one box at mid-price or better. Bantock's lavish romanticism is superbly served by ...» More

And old Silenus, shaking a green stick Of lilies, and the wood-gods in a crew Came, blithe, as in the olive copses thick Cicadae are, drunk with the noonday dew: And Dryope and Faunus followed quick, Teasing the God to sing them something new; Till in this cave they found the lady lone, Sitting upon a seat of emerald stone.

And every nymph of stream and spreading tree, And every shepherdess of Ocean’s flocks, Who drives her white waves over the green sea, And Ocean with the brine on his grey locks, And quaint Priapus with his company, All came, much wondering how the enwombèd rocks Could have brought forth so beautiful a birth:— Her love subdued their wonder and their mirth.

And then she called out of the hollow turrets Of those high clouds, white, golden, and vermilion, The armies of her ministering spirits— In mighty legions million after million They came, each troop emblazoning its merits On meteor flags; and many a proud pavilion, Of the intertexture of the atmosphere, They pitched upon the plain of the calm mere.

To those she saw most beautiful, she gave Strange panacea in a crystal bowl: They drank in their deep sleep of that sweet wave, And lived thenceforth as if some control, Mightier than life, were in them; and the grave Of such, when death oppressed the weary soul, Was as a green and over-arching bower Lit by the gems of many a starry flower.